delicacy: and he had been too virtuously educated, hastily to indulge that rash and dangerous intemperance which proves so often fatal to inconsiderate Europeans, on their first visiting the West Indies. With a considerable store of local and professional information, he returned to England about the middle of the year 1772.

It has been said that, at this period, his mind had acquired, without any apparent cause, an entire horror of the royal navy; that Captain Suckling, who beheld with anxiety the critical situation of his nephew, was soon convinced, by the sentiment he appeared to indulge in—"Aft, the most honour; but forward, the better man!"—his too credulous nephew had acquired a bias utterly foreign to his real character; and that it was many weeks before all the firmness of the captain, assisted by his thorough knowledge of the human heart, could overcome these prejudices in his nephew, and reconcile him to the service on board a king's ship.

Admitting the truth of this relation, it would be natural to suppose that Mr. Rathbone, who was probably a worthy but disappointed man, had inspired the youth with his own aversions to serving in the royal navy, without a due consideration being made for the differences of their respective interests. This gentleman, with the utmost purity of design, might wish to prepare the nephew of his friend for mortifications and disappointments to be expected in the profession he had just embraced; it was not his fault, if pictures, which he perhaps feelingly and faithfully pourtrayed from the life, excited too much abhorrence in the mind of his young pupil. The sentiment of "Aft, the most honour; but forward, the better man!" might come with no ill grace from the lips of Mr. Rathbone, but could never originate with a boy of thirteen. So far, the fact may be supported by some degree of probability, but it seems incapable of proof.

In the family, no such circumstance appears to be remembered. It is well recollected—in some degree, to the contrary—that, on a slight intimation from his father, of a wish that he might entirely quit the sea-service, he resolutely declared, that if he were not again sent out, he would set off without any assistance.

It may, however, be taken for granted, that he wished for more active employment in seamanship, than he could well expect to obtain, on board a man of war, in the capacity of a midshipman. The mode which his uncle is said to have adopted for what is called the recovery of the original bias of his nephew's mind, was to work on the ambition which, it is on all hands agreed, he in a supereminent degree possessed, to become a thorough seaman.

Captain Suckling had recently been appointed to the command of the Triumph, then lying at Chatham; on board of which ship he placed his nephew, in July 1772, immediately after the youth's return from the West Indies, in his old situation on the quarter-deck: and, though he had, thus, the "aft" situation of "most honour," the uncle contrived that he should, at the same time, be permitted to enjoy all the advantages of the "forward," which might be supposed to form "the better man." This he judiciously effected, by permitting him to go in the cutter and decked long-boat attached to the commanding officer's ship at Chatham: an indulgence which afforded him the highest satisfaction; while it tended so largely to promote his practical knowledge of navigation, that he is said to have soon actually become an excellent pilot for such vessels as sail from Chatham to the Tower of London, and down the Swin Channel to the North Foreland.

It was thus that this young seaman, by being continually engaged in the successful navigation of difficult passages, or dangerous coasts, habitually acquired that experimental reliance on his own skill, and that internal self-possession, which so essentially contribute to establish the dauntless intrepidity of a truly heroic mind. He felt a conviction of his growing powers, and panted for opportunities of bringing them to the proof. His present sphere of action, confined to a comparatively small spot, for the Triumph never once went out to sea while he remained on board, made him languish for some new situation, better suited to his enterprising spirit; and it was not long before an occurrence took place, which seemed to promise the gratification of his most sanguine wish.

About the beginning of February 1773, the Earl of Sandwich, then First Lord of the Admiralty, in consequence of an application which had been made to him by the Royal Society, laid before the King a proposal for an expedition to try how far navigation might be practicable towards the North Pole; which his Majesty was pleased to direct should be immediately undertaken, with every encouragement that could countenance such an enterprise, and every assistance that could contribute to it's success. The Racehorse and Carcass bombs, being selected as the strongest, and therefore the properest, vessels to be employed in this voyage, were taken into dock, and fitted in the most complete manner for the service. The command of the former was given to Captain Constantine John Phipps, afterwards Lord Mulgrave; and that of the latter, to Captain Skeffington Lutwidge, now Admiral of the White. The complement for each was fixed at ninety men; and the ordinary establishment departed from, by appointing an additional number of officers, the whole recommended by their respective captains, and entering effective men instead of the usual number of boys Two masters of Greenlandmen were employed as pilots for each ship; the Racehorse was furnished with new chain-pumps on Captain Bentinck's improved plan; Dr. Irving's apparatus for distilling fresh water from the sea was adopted; Mr. Israel Lyons was engaged, by the Board of Longitude, to embark in this voyage, for the purpose of making astronomical observations; the board also sent two watch machines for keeping the longitude by difference of time, one on Mr. Harrison's principles, the other by Mr. Arnold; and, in short, every possible arrangement was made effectually to decide the long-agitated question concerning the practicability of a north-east passage into the Pacific ocean.

The report of this scientific voyage, from which so much nautical knowledge could not fail to be derived by a youth thirsting for professional information, most powerfully attracted the enterprising spirit of young Nelson; who resolved, if possible, to participate in it's advantages, without any apprehensions from the perils to which he must necessarily be exposed in it's pursuit. It may, indeed, be justly doubted, whether the hope of successfully encountering these very perils might not constitute one of its chief charms for his intrepid mind.

Notwithstanding, therefore, the implied interdiction of the Admiralty, respecting the employment of boys on this hazardous voyage, he so powerfully pleaded with Captain Lutwidge to be appointed coxswain, and so fully satisfied him he was not unqualified for the task, that the worthy captain at length, kindly consented to receive him in this capacity; and, though the Carcass, when fitted, being found too deep in the water to proceed to sea with safety, was constrained to put part of her guns on shore, and reduce her complement to eighty men, the young coxswain felt himself already too firmly fixed in his captain's favour to dread being one of the dismissed number.

On the 30th of May 1773, Captain Lutwidge, in the Carcass, joined Captain Phipps, in the Racehorse, at the Nore: but, being delayed, by the easterly winds, till the 4th of June, his majesty's birth-day, at six o'clock that morning, both ships weighed; and Captain Lutwidge, having received his orders from Captain Phipps, they immediately sailed on the expedition.

The journal of this important voyage, during which so much was seen and suffered, Captain Phipps published soon after his return, in a